I cover science and public policy, environmental sustainability, media ideology, NGO advocacy and corporate responsibility. I'm executive director of the Genetic Literacy Project (www.GeneticLiteracyProject.org), an independent NGO, and Senior Fellow at the World Food Center's Institute for Food and Agricultural Literacy at the University of California-Davis. I've edited/authored seven books on genetics, chemicals, risk assessment and sustainability, and my favorite, on why I never graduated from college football player (place kicker) to pro athlete: "Taboo: Why Black Athletes Dominate Sports and Why We're Afraid to Talk About It". Previously, I was a producer and executive for 20 yeas at ABC News and NBC News. Motto: Follow the facts, not the ideology. Play hard. Love dogs.

From 50% to 80% of Americans, depending on the poll and how one interprets the data, do not believe in evolution. Yet natural selection theory has been settled science for more than a century. Even the Catholic Church agrees that evolution doesn’t have to conflict with church dogma. So, what gives?

The explanation, according to Mooney is simple: conservatives are scientifically illiterate. Mooney bases his conclusions primarily on two issues: anthropogenic global warming and evolution. The heat generated by Republican grey matter working through complex scientific theories pops their hard-wired neural circuits like corn heating in a kettle. Because science is made up of “facts,” he writes, there must be some neuro-cognitive evolutionary reason for why the right wing brain limps along as it does. He equates the far right of the Republican base, which does fervently embrace these anti-science views, with both Republicans and conservatives in general.

It’s a neat theory: Republicans are congenitally defective. Well, he doesn’t use the word “defective”. He does say he believes they are cognitively incapable of accepting such staggeringly complex concepts as “survival of the fittest.” But he’s got a big heart. I’m not making value judgements, he’s quick to claim. I’m just reporting facts. We should try to understand these mental slackers not blame them.

Just-so science

Mooney’s narrative reminds me of the fanciful Rudyard Kipling tale about how the leopard got its spots. They came about courtesy of the leopard’s friend, an Ethiopian, who painted it with black paint left over from darkening his own skin. Kipling’s wonderful turn-of-the-20th century “Just So Stories” contain fictional tales that pretend to explain scientific phenomenon. No one takes them seriously. The trouble with Mooney’s “just so” story about the biology of politics is that some people—mostly Democratic ideologues—do believe it.

Trendy science journalism has long been hampered by a style of argument that identifies patterns of behavior and then tries to construct adaptive explanations for why this group thinks that way or why that group votes this way. These speculations have been charitably called “science.” They should be more contemptuously labeled “just-so stories” as they rely on the fallacious assumption that every behavior exists for a biologically deterministic reason.

Let’s return to our Jeopardy contest, which highlights a classic just so story. What’s the correct answer? There is a clear Republican-Democrat split over the validity of evolutionary theory, although neither party’s adherents win awards as a group for scientific literacy. In the latest poll on this subject, by Fox News, in September 2011, the pollsters asked: Which do you think is more likely to actually be the explanation for the origin of human life on Earth, the biblical account or Darwin’s theory of evolution or both accounts (which is logically impossible, but humans are not always logical).

The results are frightening. Only 28% of Democrats and 13% of Republicans accept the purely scientific explanation. So, are both Democrat and Republican brains defective? To make his case, Mooney flips the issue upside down, lumping together as evolution supporters those who subscribe to the science and those who believe that God guided evolution (the “both” category). Using this metric, 52% of Democrats and 41% of Republicans subscribe wholly or in part to evolutionary theory. That’s a real but hardly earth shaking difference.

These patterns have persisted for decades, and scientific literacy on this issue may even be backsliding. In 2005, an NBC poll found that 33% of Americans subscribed to strict evolutionary theory; 57% believed in either the fundamentalist Biblical version of human origins, which holds that the earth was created in six days and a crafty snake talked poor Eve into sinning, or a divine presence.

Polling on hot-button science issues almost never breaks down the data by racial groups. But a friend of mine, who is an internationally respected geneticist and dean of research at the Joint School of Nano-science and Nano-engineering at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and North Carolina A&T University, was curious. Joe Graves,, who is black, asked pollsters Peter Hart and Bill McInturff for the response percentages among African Americans. Graves was saddened by what he was told. Only 16% of blacks believed in evolution; 80% accept a Biblical account at least in part; and most disturbing, he says, 60% take the Bible, as scientific gospel.

How do the views of blacks compare to tea partiers? They didn’t exist in 2005, but we do have recent polling data. The Fox survey, in line with others, found that 66% accept the Biblical account in whole or in part and 55% believe in the literal truth of the Bible.

The problem with just so theories is that, like Eve’s serpent, they come back to bite. Mooney has trapped himself into arguing that both tea partiers and African Americans have defective brains, with black “Democratic” brains being more so.

Why do blacks as a group reject evolution more than any other demographic in America, including conservatives? As Graves notes, the majority of American blacks belong to fundamentalist Protestant denominations, such as the National Baptist Convention, which claims that every aspect of the Bible is true. Graves believes the best explanation for anti-science thinking is not the Republican/Democrat divide but the religious and educational schisms in America. Tea partiers and African Americans, as groups, share certain characteristics. Their educational levels are low and their religious fervor is high. Several studies have demonstrated a negative relationship between student religiosity and likelihood to take science classes or pursue a science career. Turns out that if you factor in education and strength of religious belief, the Democrat-Republican divide dissolves almost entirely.

Liberal precautionary politics

As other critics of Mooney’s speculations have pointed out, by subject matter, the left anti-science kook index is remarkably high. It includes “natural” remedies and alternative medicine, the special nutritional benefits of organics, the inherent threat of genetically modified crops, cell phones as carcinogens, the link between vaccines and autism, the toxicity of tested and approved chemicals, the intrinsic dangers of fracking and nuclear power, etc. etc.

Mooney goes apoplectic at any suggestion of equivalency. He contends that conservative denialism is more consequential than the liberal version. He excuses it as the product of really good intentions gone bad or mainstream liberal belief in the “do not harm” dogma of the “precautionary principle,” which he praises as sound science. Few scientists would agree.

In 1992 delegates at the United Nation’s Rio Earth Summit approved a statement declaring: “Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.” (emphasis added)

Led by the liberal “The Science and Environmental Health Network” and with the strong support of such mainstream leftist groups as the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Environmental Working Group, Greenpeace and the like, activists junked the UN statement and adopted the far more radical: “When an activity raises threats of harm to human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not fully established scientifically.” (emphasis added)

The switch from a standard based on “irreversible danger” to one grounded in “harm” rankles scientists. In its crudest application liberals invoke the precautionary principle as a means of deciding whether to allow corporate activity and technological innovation that merely might have undesirable side effects on health or the environment. In practice, the principle is strongly biased against the process of trial-and-error so vital to progress and the continued survival and well being of humanity.

I couldn’t find any polls of scientists on this issue, but most international scientific bodies, including regulators in precautionary Europe, reject the hard-left version of the precautionary principle endorsed by Mooney. An informal survey of 40 top scientists by the British free thinking group Spiked found almost no one who supports the mainstream liberal view. Writes Spiked:

“Imagine medicine without vaccines, penicillin, antibiotics, aspirin, X-rays, heart surgery, or the contraceptive Pill. Imagine scientific theory without Newton, Galileo, quantum mechanics, or the human genome project. Imagine transport without airplanes, railways, cars or bicycles; power without gas, electricity, or nuclear energy; agriculture without pesticides, hybrid crops or the plow. Imagine man had never been to the moon. This is how scientists imagine history, had past developments been subject to the constraints of the ‘precautionary principle—the assumption that experimentation should only proceed where there is a guarantee that the outcome will not be harmful.”

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In “Darwin’s Black Box”, Michael Behe confessed that he had “no reason to doubt that the universe is billions of years old”, and that he had “no particular reason to doubt” common descent (p. 5).

I heard him personally reaffirm those positions when he appeared here locally, even admitting the same feelings towards the reality of “natural selection”.

Behe is an “evolutionist”, although one might equivocate on just what they mean by that.

He gave speeches on all of that at a local university as well as a local church. The two speeches were not the same. I got the church version where he also espoused his adherence to the Catholic position (e.g., Pope Benedict in particular) on the issue.

Well written article which underlines a important issue with people and science in general. Science is treated unequally, Republicans will use studies and scientific research when it suits them and throw it out when it does not. Democrats do the same thing. If (and I don’t believe this) Global warming came out as a falsehood tomorrow I can almost guarantee that Democrats would still be pushing for tougher environmental regulation, carbon taxes and every other issue that they raise as an solution to global warming for the simple fact that all of these were ideas before global warming was an issue. Science is used as support for per-existing opinions in politics not for making opinions.

The authoritarian left believes science is the servant of power. Their viewpoint about global warming (or anything else ecological) is actually religious, meaning faith-based and appealing to emotion (see Michael Crichton’s essay on the topic).

The authoritarian (religious) right endorses pseudo-science (creation ‘science’) in order to subordinate evolution, makiing both pseudo-science and science servants of power. This is also a viewpoint driven by faith and emotion.

The percent of voters that hold one or the other view is something I would rather not think about. The lack of reasoning and level of ignorance for both is legion; the will to power is frightening.

Yes, yes…wait…aren’t liberals the ones that need the Nanny State to tell them every single aspect of how to live? Why yes! Yes they do! Also, I don’t know one conservative that completely discounts evolution. But I know many liberals who think that devolution, in the form of faith in Big Government as the sole savior, is the absolute of life. Psssh! All hail the recipient!

You must not live in a conservative area as I do then because I know many that discount eveolution in total and would say if it isn’t in the bible, it isn’t true.

The right wing , especially the tea party, has been spoon fed propaganda from groups who know how to hire and organize people to serve interest that are not thier, but think they are.

The Koch brothers, with the media such as Fox convinces these people that communism is around the corner, Obama is the devil, Climate change is a hoax, and only the right cares about freedom.

It is easy to track these facts and as been done by people who wanted to show who is really behind this propaganda.

Propaganda bypasses intelligence and goes to the heart/gut of people, and has been used forever. And with half our nation being evangilistic they already have a base in science fiction and fantasy, and so are half way thier before being spoon fed the speeches on fear, the end is near (just not by globel warming), and their religion is being attacked and freedoms removed by the liberals

I submitted this following Farrell’s recent column here, but it was not “called out”. It seems it may have more of an application here.

It appears it will work in just fine as it relates to the above article and the popular public debate over “evolution” and, fundamentally, the age of stuff (e.g., Ken Ham being a most popular proponent of the notion that “nothing is more than a few thousand years old”).

I have, as a tyro, come up with a very simple exercise in critical thinking that deals with the popular, anti-evolution, young-earth creation-science notion that “nothing is more than a few thousand years old”.

It even has a name; given by one of my adversaries and admirers.

It’s called the “Goliath of GRAS” and even in recent days it has confounded the young-earth creation-science promoters that populate the various blogs sponsored by The Christian Post ( http://www.christianpost.com ).

The exercise involves the critical analysis of an argument, step by step.

The successful completion of the exercise, or even an attempt and failure, has repeatedly demonstrated, in part, why it is that young-earth creation-science promoters have failed in their scientific pretensions and legal challenges without having to resort to fussing over technical, scientific details that few are qualified to address or engaging in Mahoney-level rhetoric.

Here’s the argument that so confounds its adversaries:

The “Goliath of GRAS”

MAJOR PREMISE:

> IF (A) God’s word (the text) says > everything began over a period > of six days, and > > IF (B) God’s word (the text) is > interpreted by some to mean it > was six 24-hour days occurring > a few thousand years ago, and > > IF (C) there is empirical > evidence that some thing is > actually much older than a > few thousand years, > > THEN (D) the interpretation of > the text by some is wrong.

MINOR PREMISE:

> (A) God’s word (the text) says > everything began over a period > of six days, and > > (B) God’s word (the text) is > interpreted by some to mean it > was six 24-hour days occurring > a few thousand years ago, and > > (C) there is empirical evidence > that some thing is actually much > older than a few thousand years.

CONCLUSION:

> (D) The interpretation of the > text by some is wrong.

Maybe we’ll see how the Forbes audience takes to it; so much more might be said, especially if any there be wanting to engage in the exercise.

After all these years, no “David” has “come forth” to defeat my “Goliath of GRAS”.

Republicans, as a group, are no less intelligent than Democrats as a group. They are also no more or less in favor of or opposed to science, as a group, than the opposing political party. However, the Republican Party is completely committed to pandering to those who are against select areas of science, climatology and biology. A major component of the Republican base are Fundamentalists. Fundamentalism is a political philosophy that holds religious leaders should be given political power by virtue of their standing as authority’s on religion. Some aspects of the US political system are not “democratic”. For example, only licensed engineers can produce blue prints and plans that a city planning department or commission will recognize . More importantly, engineers and associations of engineers are afforded a certain quasi-official status, such testifying in court, before legislative bodies, or even in the popular press, as experts. Reports from such organizations carry much weight in the popular arena, elected and appointed officials. Fundamentalism is about giving that same un-democratic power to religious leaders based on their religious expertise. Creationism is an extension of that political agenda, to create a “science” in which religious leaders would be “experts”.

The Republican Party has been willing to embrace the Fundamentalist movement in order to obtain Fundamentalist votes in elections. They are thus willing to at least tolerate, in not actively embrace, creationism and other related anti-science ideas. They do this not from personal or even collective conviction but political calculation. Supporting creationism means votes in elections.

The same is true for the Republican’s Party embrace of the Anti-Global Warming movement. This is a creation of the carbon fuel industry which as a pretty clear vested interest in this movement which is obviously anti-scientific (or at least anti-climatology). However the Republican Party has made this movement its own for cynical political reasons, not because they are “stupid”.